Alexander Zverev plane struck by lightning and forced into emergency landing

has revealed his plane was struck by lightning on the way to the . The 28-year-old was travelling to Paris after being knocked out of the Hamburg Open by Alexandre Muller on Wednesday.

Zverev has endured a difficult spell on the court and failed to progress beyond the second round in Hamburg. He was dumped out of the Italian Open at the quarter-final stage at the start of May and was dispatched by Francisco Cerundolo in the last-16 of the Madrid Open last month. But he won the BMW Open on the Munich clay in mid-April and will be one of the favourites to lift the trophy at Roland Garros after .

"My trip over was phenomenal, actually," Zverev began as he detailed his experience. "Some funny stories there. My trip here was funny because we were supposed to fly yesterday evening at 6.45pm. We took off from Hamburg and we were flying together with [Jiri] Lehecka, [Brandon] Nakashima, some doubles guys - and we got struck by lightning.

"So we had to do an emergency landing back in Hamburg. Couldn't find another plane, so everybody else flew the next morning. I took another plane and flew around 1am, so I arrived here at 3am.

"So that was quite funny. It was the first time [in my] experience [that a plane was] struck by lightning mid-air, which is funny because it was a little noise, no real wobbling, nothing, but yeah. So that was my trip over. Best story of Roland Garros so far."

Zverev has reached three Grand Slam finals throughout his career but is yet to land a Major trophy.

He was defeated by Dominic Thiem in the 2020 US Open final, before succumbing to Carlos Alcaraz in Paris a year ago. And at the start of this year, the talented star was in the Australian Open showpiece match.

Zverev edged into a 2-1 lead in last year's French Open final as he won the second and third sets against his opponent. But in the final set as the umpire incorrectly overruled a call after Alcaraz had hit a double fault at break point down. And the Spaniard went on to claim victory.

"I mean, I feel like I did everything I could today," Zverev explained after his defeat to Alcaraz. "The fifth set, f***, there was some unlucky moments.

"I heard that at 2-1 [in the final set] the second serve was out. From the Hawk-Eye data, I saw that. I break back there, I have break chances, and then in the next service game, a fifth set can go the other way.

"But it is what it is. Look, he played fantastic. He played better than me in the fourth and fifth set. It's how it is. I felt like this Grand Slam final I did everything I could. At the US Open I kind of gave it away myself. It's a bit different."